


i'm getting over you.

by cp035



Series: Tumblr Prompts [5]
Category: Figure Skating RPF
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-08
Updated: 2014-12-08
Packaged: 2018-02-28 14:38:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,881
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2736287
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cp035/pseuds/cp035
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tumblr Prompt: "Oh fuck. Oh fuck!" and "Shit! Are you bleeding?" </p><p>Role-reversal fic. Meryl and Jeremy have been dating for five years and are about to get married. Charlie's not jealous; he's just wondering how she ended up with all of that; and he ended up being the guy who's always two steps behind.</p>
            </blockquote>





	i'm getting over you.

**Author's Note:**

  * For [chickentine](https://archiveofourown.org/users/chickentine/gifts), [footnoterphone](https://archiveofourown.org/users/footnoterphone/gifts), [GreenFish](https://archiveofourown.org/users/GreenFish/gifts).



> Either Nora or Penny suggested this idea! So, credit to them and I hope they, and Frances; enjoy this piece! 
> 
> JerMer's a fair bit more public than Chanith is; and there are some omitted events in here, but feel free to expound upon the universe should you want to! :)

He does it in Japan, of fucking course, Charlie thinks bitterly to himself as he and Alex Shibutani- who has the balls not to act like he's taking his Olympic Gold Medal-winning best friend out to drink his sorrows, even though that's _exactly_ what's up- slide into a booth at a seedy bar in Narita.

 

Of course, it's bright and the tables boast cutesy centerpieces because they're in fucking Japan, but the light of the little helicopter-head creature Alex spins with his finger doesn't really reach down into Charlie's soul, and light him up from within like his partner was; on the ice while Mao Asada, thrilled at the whole display, snapped pictures on her phone and squealed.

 

"You _knew_ this was coming.", Alex offers, with a sigh, and Charlie shoots him a contemptuous glare that could melt the ice in the stadium where they're performing.

 

"So? I didn't think he would do it like _that_!"

 

"Yeah, I didn't think Meryl was into public proposals. Or Jeremy. It was kind of weird. Especially in Japan, because our traditions are kind of different-"

 

"I didn't think he'd do it in _fucking_ front of me.", Charlie groans.

 

"Oh."

 

Alex gets them drinks. He pulls a notebook from his pocket and scribbles the kanji from the menu in the margins.

 

"Hey, Charlie, lets see what makes you forget how to spell you name first. Start with the red one. For science!"

 

It's something green; with a slice of what he wants to think is Jello with a bitter center that makes Charlie forget that his name is spelled with a C, not an S.

 

"What the fuck- _Charlie. S-H-A-R-L-I-E._ That's me."

 

Alex just shakes his head. "No way, man. _D-R-U-N-K._ That's you."

 

" _D-R-U_...-hey, dude- you can't call me a cunt. You shouldn't even be _saying_ cunt. _That's such a bad word_.", he giggles; perhaps involuntarily; as Alex leans across the table and sucks the rest of his drink from the bright yellow straw.

 

He forgets the E with a caramel custard-ringed shotglass before Alex has the good sense to stop laughing and finally take him home.

 

* * *

 

 

The alcohol doesn't make Charlie forget Moscow; in the autumn chill outside the cathedral every skater was lining up to take pictures in front of- when Meryl's hand comfortably slipped into his back pockets and he let her relax into his, cuddling her into the center of his chest like they were dating; while their Moms snapped pictures and pointed up at the spires of the church.

 

"Did you...were you _trying_ to touch my butt?", Charlie whispers to her, and Meryl throws her head back, laughing.

 

"I did that enough last night, didn't I?", she teases, eyeing their mothers, walking in front of them with cameras pointed at just about everything. Charlie blushes, and he jams his hands even deeper into the pockets of his jeans. Meryl just shakes her head, lightly slapping his arm.

 

" _Relax_. They don't know.", she tells him, nodding up ahead. "And I know.. _.the rules_. We've gotta wait until...we aren't skating anymore. That doesn't mean I didn't _like_ it...-"

 

"Oh; I feel that. It was kind of _awesome_. But you know, once we retire, Meryl- it's gonna be like shaking a bottle of Coke and then opening it."

 

"A powder keg, Charlie. Say _powder keg_. It's _way_ more mature."

 

She was crazy then; and he was stupid- letting her wrap her arms around his waist, ruffling her hair and pulling her into his side because she told him he was cold, and in those days- he _always_ believed her.

 

* * *

 

 

The embarrassment of puking his guts out the window of the car they hire to speed them through the city; while Alex covers his face with his sweaty t-shirt because people actually give a fuck who he is here doesn't make him forget Vancouver; his silver medal hanging heavy around his neck while Meryl is chatted up by Jeremy Abbott, who had gone into the Olympics with so much momentum, only to blow it all in the moment it mattered.

 

Jeremy's hair is honey brown; closer to ginger, really, and his face is pale and shiny in a way that makes him and Meryl look related while they both hunch over barstools and pretend they aren't both shy and neurotic and won't go back to the rooms they share with their parents and cry on their mother's shoulders because the experience is just _entirely too much_.

 

Charlie shakes his head; and he lets Tanith Belbin take him out for a dance.

 

They have fun, too.

 

Five months later; Tanith is dating Scott Moir and she and Charlie are still good friends, who go out for coffee regularly. She has a dog who she lets him take out for walks; and sometimes, the three of them hang out and he and Scott take her to hockey games, get drunk in the gardens and have her drive them home, singing along to Bon Jovi on highways he doesn't remember, either.

 

She is sweet and funny and they are perfect.

 

Meryl is still dating Jeremy; and she and Charlie are bristling. Tessa and Meryl squeal over his latest romantic overtures, the bubble baths he sets her after a hard training day and how he takes her into the city to see real Italian films, and mixes the best margaritas and dresses so impressively no one ever guesses that he's very much straight, especially in bed with her. Marina compliments Charlie on showing "new passion" and Igor says he liked this improvement in their connection.

 

They always look like lovers lost; longing for each other on the ice.

 

But, Meryl is happy with Jeremy.

 

Scott and Tanith fight and break up.

 

Charlie's dating a girl from school; and when it doesn't go anywhere, he falls into bed with Tanith and they fall back into their old routine, except now, it's Scott who walks her dog and buys her coffee in the morning. They still go to hockey games; and get drunk and sing Bon Jovi. Tanith gets a few jobs doing skating commentary; and brings Charlie and Scott strange souvenirs from places they all have been, with a story which always makes him smile when he sees her knickknacks lined up on his desk.

 

They're all perfect.

 

_He's losing her._

 

* * *

 

 

The hangover doesn't make him forget Sochi; where he tells her he loves her, and she says "Me too.", as earnestly as they were back in Russia all over again, putting each other's hands in the other person's pockets, with their little inside jokes about powder kegs and Coke.

 

She drags him by the collar of his navy blue Team USA sweater, through the USA house away from the crowd below who screams for them, away from their prying parents and crowds of their friends.

 

"I want to do something completely insane. I just won _a fucking Olympic Gold Medal_. We just did that; Charlie-"

 

"I know, Oh my God. _Oh fuck. Oh Fuck!_ "

 

She should be celebrating with Jeremy; riding on his shoulders while he raises her medal above their heads and kisses her for all the world to see; and he should be with Tanith, letting the streamers in the pop-up NBC studio rain down on him while the cameramen cheer.

 

Instead; they celebrate with each other. It's messy, and fast- and Meryl shakes with barely muffled laughter when Charlie swears he hears Evan- _fucking_ -Bates outside, about to knock on their door.

 

"Interloper.", he grunts.

 

"I love your vocabulary.", Meryl squeals, too excited and euphoric to care that she's complimenting his vocabulary while they have sex at the Olympics.

 

" _I love you._ "

 

Jeremy implodes in his event; and Meryl, granted a break from all of she and Charlie's interviews and photo-ops, sits up in the stands with her parents and her brother and his mother; who all gasp at the sickening thud he makes spinning out of his first jump. He can practically feel her heart clench, watching them all from a huge screen in Tanith's studio, while she grips his hand hard enough to break it.

 

"That doesn't look good at all.", she says, worriedly, her fingers drumming against the back of his chair.

 

Meryl's mouth is open in shock; and her flag drops into her lap. It is the closest to truly devastated Charlie has ever seen her, immortalized forever on the massive NBC screens everywhere around them.

 

"That's not supposed to _happen_. He's _supposed_ to win. We were supposed to be gold medalists _together_ and I know he didn't do as well in the team event but that's the _team_ and this isn't-", she mouths to her mother, soundless on TV before the camera pans out back to the ice, and he feels something wrench through him and almost wants to cry.

 

_She's gone._

 

* * *

 

 

 

When they get back home, in a manner of speaking; Meryl and Charlie both say no to precisely nothing.

 

Tanith books a job in LA; and she and Charlie's break-up is amicable as break-ups are, when you've shared almost six years of being best friends who happen to fuck. They go out for coffee in the morning; and he loads her things into his car and hugs her. They sing Bon Jovi, speeding down the highway to the airport, and they thank each other and share one last kiss before her flight is called.

 

They will always be perfect, just like that.

 

They're going to be on Dancing with the Stars, and Meryl is so excited; sitting beside him on the plane to New York City that Charlie almost doesn't mind; that Jeremy is home in Detroit, training for Worlds. Her hand is warm in his and she purrs into his shoulder, half-asleep. Predictably; Jeremy does the very _Jeremy_ thing and sucks ass in his event and when he announces he wants to go another season, Meryl stands beside him. Charlie wonders if she's ever considered a life away from all of this or if it's just so deep in her blood that nothing else makes any sense.

 

In Week Three; he is sitting on a cold; hard-backed wooden bench in the skybox above the Dancing With The Stars studio; while Meryl's video package plays and her voice, tinny in the speakers seems to be speaking only to him.

 

"- I just want to dedicate this to my amazing boyfriend of five years; Jeremy, who's been with me through everything and made this incredible year so much more exciting, and of course, my parents, and my friends, and _everyone_ who's made all of this possible-"

 

His breath catches in his throat and he regrets having told her "-this week isn't about just a year, it's about a journey. And maybe that sounds kinda cheesy, but y'know, it's been 17 years and I wouldn't have won an Olympic Gold Medal without _anyone_ else by my side. So yeah; this is for you, guys! Love you!"

 

His partner; Sharna's hand curls protectively around his, and he tries to think about that- Sharna being a good person, who is regrettably also single and maybe kind of thirsty like he is, when she follows him up to his hotel room and he follows the lines of her body with his hands, molding to her hips and making her scream his name.

 

She enjoys it; which is good. He thinks of Russia; which is bad.

 

Charlie likes to think if he and Meryl's places were reversed; he would have waited for her.

 

He's always been there for her, so naturally, it hurts when it turns out she never needed him.

 

* * *

 

 

Meryl's partner, Maks is engaged to one of the other dancers; Karina, and between the camera panning to Jeremy's moony face and his exactly ten different _Go Meryl!_ t-shirts; and the giant " _Meryl Davis, you're amazing!_ " cardboard sign he brings in on Week Eight; and Maks and Karina's not-so-subtle implications that they're had _shenanigans_ in every room of the fucking studio; people love them. Maks makes Meryl a bit more extroverted; the way she is around only Charlie and Jeremy and their friends; and he tries to be happy for her, joking around with her partner and dancing with his brother like she's been around the block with him a hundred times.

 

Charlie aggressively flirts with Sharna; but she isn't Maks. She isn't the one with fourteen seasons worth of fans clamoring for his comeback; and his fiance's fans when she's eliminated with some hockey player in those first few weeks.

 

Tanith comes for a couple of the live shows, in her expensive new wardrobe; and one night, he takes her out for dinner to commiserate over how TV is such bullshit; and he almost wishes they had worked out.

 

He and Meryl are on tour, and they're exhausted all the time; and Jeremy snaps pictures of them napping together in the locker room without a word. If he's angry; it doesn't show' but Charlie wishes it did. He wishes that just once, Jeremy Abbott would _really_ snap, and maybe punch him in the face and get him sent to the hospital. Maybe brain damage would free him of feeling like human shit every time Jeremy kisses her forehead and gently squeezes her hand before she spins into a dance hold with Charlie.

 

* * *

 

 

He isn't the least bit surprised to be eliminated in Week Nine, when his heart isn't in it anymore, and suddenly he and Sharna's relationship fizzles and he takes Tanith out for dinner again.

 

Meryl is in the final; and Jeremy tells all of America; just before she and Maks take to the floor for a final dance; "-of course I've always known she's got it in her to win. She's incredible, just- of course, everyone's seen how much drive and passion she has, but I think that what's made all of this so special for Meryl is that she's finally gotten to show all of you the wonderful woman _I wake up beside every morning_...wait, was that too much for primetime TV?"

 

Charlie dances with her in the bumper; and tries to ignore him; sitting in the front row, wearing a shirt that reads _"Team M & M For the Win!"_, in bright tye-dye script; cheering louder than the rest of the assembled audience while Charlie tries to breathe in the last of this girl; who has been everything to him for the longest time.

 

It isn't that Charlie's jealous; it's just that he wishes Jeremy were easier to hate.

 

* * *

 

 

She wins the whole thing; and in celebration for taking home a trophy which Sharna tells him only costs seven dollars; Jeremy buys her a bulldog, just like Maks and Karina's, which just fuels the rumors that they're all _totally going to have an awesome celebrity double wedding that will just need to be on the front cover of_ People _._

 

"We're calling him _Finnegan_. It's Sir Sleep's brother! Get it, because of the finnstep?", she laughs, one rare weekend when they're back in Michigan.

 

"You can't name your dog after the Finnstep, Meryl. C'mon, is it to late to change it? Maybe you could call him, Boris. Or Oleg.", he jokes, clipping on Finnegan's leash.

 

"His nickname could be Bear!"

 

They're both laughing as he shuts the door of his condo behind them; jogging lightly beside her as she starts up the street. This could be their life; but when he hands off Finn's leash to her on the doorstep of the suburban Detroit home she and Jeremy bought when they got back from their long-awaited Hawaiian vacation, he knows it isn't.

 

She hugs him, as Finnegan runs inside to Jeremy, lingering for just a moment too long.

 

"I named him Finn because I wanted it to be poetic, like he's always a reminder of the _best_ year of my life. Thank you _so_ much, Charlie."

 

* * *

 

 

 

Jeremy proposes to her; as immortalized by the television broadcast of _The Ice_ and all the YouTube videos from the assembled thousand screaming Japanese fans- just as she's about to come off the ice from the ladies' number she and Charlie had choreographed. Gracie Gold is telling her a joke; and Meryl is laughing, and Charlie, with Alex and Maxim Kovtun from Russia, waiting in the wings, locks eyes with her as she scrapes to a stop before the gate.

 

In that moment, Jeremy looks harmless, stripping off his jacket and laughing while Patrick Chan snaps a selfie of the both of them beside the boards; and Meryl slips her hand into his.

 

"Hey, come on- there's kids here!", Mae Berenice, the skater from France, chuckles, pointing to Gracie, and she just shakes her head.

 

"Adelina's seventeen!", she shoots back, faking petulance.

 

Except, instead of the world continuing to turn, Jeremy's hand brushes against Meryl's cheek, and she giggles- just as much in love as she had been the first night she talked to him in Vancouver; when she and Jeremy had become only boyfriend and girlfriend, not soulmates who had a dog and lived in a quaint little suburban neighborhood two blocks from an elementary school.

 

"Hey, you have something-", he whispers, loud enough it seems, so only Charlie could hear it, as the other skaters mill around them, blades scraping against the concrete. Jeremy cups her face in his hand, bringing her around so the two of them are facing each other, his chin rubbing against her forehead. Maia Shibutani gives away her age by making a noise that sounds suspiciously to Charlie like swooning; and Alex mimes gagging.

 

"What? Hey, on my face? _Frick_!"

 

"No, not on your face. You face is _perfect_.", Jeremy murmurs to her, kissing her cheek. " _You_ are absolutely perfect."

 

It's dark in the wings; but Charlie still stifles an eye roll.

 

"No, here, it's just-", he sinks down lower, to the floor on one knee, pulling a velvet box from his pocket; as Meryl's hand fly to cover her mouth.

 

"I couldn't think of any other, less _stupid_ way to do this, or to say it, but-", Jeremy pauses just long enough for someone to fix a spotlight from center ice to the scene at the boards, whether he's planned it or not, Charlie never knows, "-I was wondering if you would do me the honor, Meryl Elizabeth Davis; of making me an honest man. _Will you marry me_?"

 

"Yes! _Yes. Absolutely_.", she squeals, then her voice lowers to a breathy whisper, just for them, as though she doesn't know that the entire stadium is watching her reaction with bated breath on the big screen. Maybe, she doesn't; Charlie tells himself, as Maia and Mao Asada run past him and even Maxim cranes his neck to look at Meryl's ring; while she looks as euphoric and elated as she did that night in Sochi.

 

The stadium erupts in cheers, and Meryl doesn't mind who sees her cry for the very first time in her life.

 

Charlie feels like human shit; because all this time he's held out for them, it was because he'd never imagined someone else could make her feel as incredible as she's always made him.

 

He was _wrong._

 

Wrapped in Jeremy's arms, her eyes just above his shoulder, being crushed in a circle of arms and love that he stands slightly outside with Alex; Meryl's eyes find his, and he gives her a tiny, almost imperceptible nod. It's dark in the wings; but he swears he sees her smile grow even wider.

 

" _Good work_.", Charlie whispers.

 

That's just for him to hear.

 

* * *

 

 

The ring is really beautiful; and Charlie can't help but admire it, while Meryl's fingers drum on her lap table when they fly back to the States. Jeremy is behind them, sitting in the window seat beside Gracie; like an act of God. Maia and Alex are asleep on each other's shoulders a row ahead, and Patrick, sitting in the aisle beside a loud family from Argentina glares at all of them as he pulls on his headphones and blasts Canadian country music so loud he gets glared at by a flight attendant.

 

"I'm having my _rights_ trampled on. Probably because I'm Asian.", he mutters, when the flight attendant makes a second round and informs him the airline won't tolerate such abuses of their entertainment system.

 

"You're trampling on the rest of our _peace,_ man.", Charlie jokes cheekily, and Patrick rolls his eyes.

 

"How's that peace going, Chuck?", Patrick laughs, nodding towards Meryl, who dark eyes are fixed at the clouds below them, biting down on her bottom lip so hard that Charlie sees blood beading in the corner of her mouth.

 

He glares across the aisle and Patrick just shakes his head like their entire lives are some kind of joke.

 

"Meryl. _Shit, are you bleeding_?", he asks, waving a hand in front of her face. Her eyes widen and she wipes her arm against her face; leaving a long, bloody line on her wrist.

 

"Oh my God. I shouldn't...be _doing that_ anymore.", she murmurs, clearly panicked as her head whips back to Jeremy, sleeping peacefully as Gracie watches a movie on her iPad.

 

"Pretty sure he's crazier than you are.", Charlie tells her, pulling a tissue from the basket behind the airplane seats and pressing it as gently as he can to her lip.

 

"I'm not crazy. Charlie, I'm _fine._ I'm just _nervous_."

 

"I know. Hey, I'm not going to like, rat you out, you know."

 

Meryl nods, very decisively. "I can't believe I'm getting married."

 

She holds up her hand in front of the both of them; and even Patrick turns away and pretends to be thoroughly entertained by the kid singing a nursery rhyme in Spanish.

 

"It's _perfect_ , isn't it? Wow, I never thought everything could be so perfect. Sometimes, I wonder what I did to _deserve_ all of this. Is that normal? I'm so scared sometimes, Charlie; there's just _so much_ to live up to. Do you ever feel like that?"

 

"I...-um, I don't know; Meryl. I think if you just take things one day at a time, it's better, right?"

 

"I guess so. But it's _hard_.", she says with a barely masked sigh; as though she's already weary of a world they've barely really explored. She dabs at the blood on her chin, and looks over at Charlie, fixing him with a tight, tiny smile.

 

"Is it okay if I-"

 

" _Of course_."

 

She burrows into his side; and his arms snakes around her shoulders, holding her as tightly and securely as though it's Russia all over again, with enough warmth that Charlie hopes she can imagine, even if it's just a silly dream; that this could be her life, too. Meryl is fast asleep within seconds, and he strokes her hair, combing out the tangles like he remembers watching his mother do with his sisters. She smiles in her sleep and wedges herself even tighter against him; and Charlie stares ahead, his eyes locked to the seat back in front if him.

 

It should be a sign that things are getting better; because he doesn't even move when Jeremy wakes up, and leans over him so he can press a kiss to her forehead on his way to the bathroom.


End file.
